Taken from the Imperial Archives. The red entries are Imperial, the blue entries are Rebel. All samples taken from the notes of both leaders.

+++ YEAR ONE OF THE AGE OF THE REBELLION +++

“My Emperor, we must speak.”

It was Grand Moff Tarkin. Man, that guy can annoying at times, with his disregard for personal safety and interrupting Sith Lords. No respect. But he had been made a Grand Moff for a reason – he was really good at space warfare. Not that they had seen a lot of star battles lately, since the fall of the Old Republic. I grin while remembering the old days, of playing both sides while crushing my age old enemies in the Jedi Order. Enough nostalgia! Swiveling around in my comfy chair while wearing my black bathrobe, I address the well-dressed man.

“Ssspeeeaaak,” I say in the most dramatic voice I can muster.

I can tell that my current appearance is intimidating. It’s how I continuously prevent my opponents from out-maneuvering me diplomatically. People often wince when I show up to debate them, even in holographic form. It's either that or they are afraid of Force lightning. Tarkin is sure taking his time, pulling on the collar of his uniform. I wait as long as it takes since I have nothing else to really do today. I shouldn’t have disbanded the Galactic Senate which had provided me with afternoon entertainment for the last 15 years. I have been so bored lately since I sent Vader into the field.

“It’s about … the Rebellion, sir.”

The what? He goes on to explain that the small band of wastrels who call themselves the *ahem* Alliance to Restore the Republic have currently managed to drum up some support in the galaxy. I scoff at the details – why would a bunch of Imperial haters prove to be so difficult to remove? Just send the fleet after them, and get my super-weapon running. Fools! And the subjugated planets should be reined in, so send Admiral Tagge on a mission to leverage his influence. I’ll take care of that prissy Princess Leia as she tries to turn yet another system against me. Drat that Mon Mothma, stirring up trouble after I refused to date her all those years ago.

Take a deep breath. Steady. Smile. With a sigh, I dismiss Tarkin to go do some research. Maybe he'll be useful for once. I think about future strategy. How about producing a Super Star Destroyer? How about recruiting some more troops? How about those probe droids, eh?

Anyway, time to order some nice Mandalorian tea. I love it when a plan comes together.

+++ YEAR THREE +++

From the logs of Mon Mothma:

That dratted Emperor and his lackeys. It’s only the third year of our little Rebellion against the Man, and already he’s managed to subjugate some more planets to crank out some more of his stupid AT-STs. There’s a Death Star currently sitting over Kashyyyk, looming rather angrily while it waits for the Navy to send more transport with more AT-ATs to invade. At least we managed to stop a certain punk named Yularen from helping create more loyal planets to the Empire. Last thing we need is more Star Destroyers popping up in ground combat. We can barely hold our own as it is.

I had made a desperate plea to the Mon Calamari system to join our cause. It was rebuked, as the Emperor sent a threatening email to them. If we don’t get access to larger ships soon, I won’t be able to do any damage to the Imperial fleets roaming around looking for our secret base (which is on Dantooine). They seem convinced right now we’re hiding on the other side of the galaxy, so they are trying to push us out of Rodia and Genosis. We managed to stop the mission to use more probe droids early in this campaign, meaning the Imperials were only able to scan Tatooine and Endor. If things don’t get better soon, though, I fear we’ll have to relocate should the fleet lingering in Ord Mantell get frisky.

Oh the heck with it – put all the newly deployed things in Genosis. That should make them sweat and think we’re trying to hold them from going to Ryloth. Pulling a few Hit and Runs has been 50/50 successful.

+++ YEAR SIX +++

I did not just destroy the old Republic for them to just destroy my Empire and start a brand new one!

What the heck is going on in the core worlds? I see there is a Wookie running sabotage missions on Corellia or blowing up our queued reinforcements, and then some uprising led by Mothma took us by surprise in Utapau (despite me running expensive propaganda on the big screen TVs). Somehow, only after seven years, they’ve managed to garner enough support to make my life difficult that I have to defeat them before thirteen years pass. Why hasn't Darth Vader been more effective??? FORCE CHOKE SOMEONE, YOU IMBICLE!

* deep breath, relax *

They have two large Calamari ships in production and they seem to be holding out on Ryloth. Tagge is too dumb witted to keep winning me systems, so now it’s entirely up to Tarkin to do his job. And Boba Fett only managed to capture a certain smuggler to have someone bust him out of prison. These Rebels are more trouble than I thought.

I suspect that the Rebels are really hiding out on Yavin. Recent probes aren’t turning up anything on the left side of my holomap, so it has to be over there. Or maybe Hoth. No, no, don't let them distract me! I suspect if I do find the base, they’ll just push it to Ryloth, so new orders for the Grand Moff. Capture Ryloth! He better get that job done soon! Destroying Naboo along with my vacation by using the Death Star can only inspire fear for so long! Meanwhile, let’s maneuver Veers to Dathomir and hope for the best.

I have to appear on Good Morning Galaxy soon!

+++ YEAR NINE +++

From the logs of Mon Mothma:

Oh crap.

Even with all our luck turning systems to our cause; scoring an objective or two; and our bait, we’re not going to escape this one.

First, their main fleet broke through Genosis by pure luck to find out we’re not hiding on Ryloth. The Man left a few units there to prevent us from using it to leap to safety. That and the Death Star blew up Naboo and Tatooine, despite our best attempts to blow it up. Our only hope was to stall and draw out their leaders to block their progress and their research. I made the mistake of not attacking sooner, and winning another point by taking out a meager Star Destroyer that languished next door.

Second, just as we’re a year or two away from winning this war, a freaking probe droid landed in the rec center of our secret base, right in the middle of zero-G badmitten. This freaked out almost everyone, and gave away our position to the Emperor. Almost immediately did all the fleets put on the brakes and change direction. I wanted to abandon the planet and move to Mon Calamari, but our efforts were blocked. Veers is only one system away from landing on Dantooine. If the fight makes it here, we will defend with everything we have. It’s not a lot, but I only need to win three battles here before the galaxy turns on the Emperor! Time to attack Dathomir.

Wedge and Chewie, don’t fail me now!

Note to the Next Rebel Leader: When you have the opportunity to strike at any small fleet, take it. If the Empire starts to suspect where your base is at and makes moves to get close, put as many ships in the surrounding systems as possible. Install an ion cannon and a shield generator on the base ASAP.

+++ YEAR 11 AND END OF THE AGE OF REBELLION +++

Victory is mine!

We managed to find and assault the rebel base on Dantooine FTW. Can you believe they had a base on such a remote system? Grand Moff Tarkin owes me 500 credits! Good riddance, loathsome troublemakers.

It wasn’t easy. The Rebels did a huge attack on my main fleet in Dathomir, trying to get rid of my ability to transport ground troops, but we managed to stave off their weak X-Wing fighters and corvettes. They did have one very large ship left, but it was nowhere near stopping my advance. The Death Star was way out of reach at that point, as well. Thankfully, since the cost of that thing bankrupted my entire budget for the next cycle and having it get blown up because the Rebels stole the plans would have been humiliating.

NOTE TO SELF – no matter how good you think you have it, if the Rebellion uses a good leader in combat, it can ruin your whole day. I lost four AT-STs in ground combats from their use of solid tactics, since their leader there had more options than my measly bounty hunter did (which was NONE)*. Next time, just send Veers to do all the ground work and Tarkin to do all the space work. Everyone else is there to do research, capture idiotic Rebel leaders and try to win back systems from the Alliance.

Anyway, let’s blow up Endor as part of the celebration!

** (Game ended on turn 11, and the Rebels would have won on turn 12) **

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Impressions from the players

The Imperial Player (her) - I love it, let's play again right now!

The Rebel Player (me) - BRING IT ON!!!

* We learned after that fiasco that the rule was misread and that Boba Fett can't lead troops. Not that it mattered, after that one bad combat, the Emperor used someone with a high ground tactics score every time.

Out of curiosity, what do you mean by " I wanted to abandon the planet and move to Mon Calamari, but our efforts were blocked. " ?

This one puzzled me also,as I discovered last game that resettlement of the base is a "resolve" action, it can't be opposed by the empire...

Maybe he just did not draw MCal...

The Empire deployed to Mon Calamari. I was unable to move there due to that unfortunate circumstance. There were basically no planets left to redeploy to by that point. I tried to spread out mid-game and recover planets using missions to do so with Leia, but I was blocked a lot by the Emperor. That is his best early ability, btw. Opposing any diplomatic overtures by the Rebellion.

mordai wrote:

Page 9 of the rules reference states that leaders with no tactic values cant activate a system...

We realized this only after we had gotten past that. I thought it was odd that you could have a military move with a leader with no tactics, and it wasn't until after we blew past that confrontation that I decided we would look it up. So leaders like Boba Fett and Mon Mothma can't activate and move units - the later moves were all Piett, Tarkin and Veers, because even if non-tactics leaders could move units, it wouldn't be effective to do so. Tactics can help you win or loss a battle.

Someone also asked why the Emperor's bearing would have Endor and other systems on her LEFT since looking at the board from the bottom the systems are on the RIGHT. Well, the Empire was sitting on the other side of the board, so she was looking down the board to the bottom. She had no problem reading upside-down and there is an opposite queue there for units.

It was my wife and I playing the game for the first time, and while I assumed she'd hate it since she was playing the Empire (due to a coin toss), she actually wanted to do it again. The three hours of play rolled by so fast we didn't even notice we played for three hours. I thought for sure we had only been sitting there for maybe two max.

After you get used to knowing how to roll for missions correctly and how to use the leaders to the best of their abilities does the strategy get better and the game speed up. Once the Rebellion got cranking on the Objectives did we realize that you can force an early win against the Empire. So the Empire has to learn how to use leaders in balance with missions, deployment and opposing the Rebellion turning planets to their cause. My wife found the perfect combo with using Boba Fett to do counters against Chewbacca and Wedge, while Tarkin, Veers and Piett pushed fleets around. Two guys pushed missions/research if necessary, while the other two waited for the Rebellion to try some diplomacy.

I picked apart large fleets, usually scoring a planet conversion on a good turn and sabotaging production as the Rebels. I had a leader in reserve to always counter that possible mission to look at a bunch of probe cards. Prevent that at all costs - the sooner the Empire finds out where the base is, the Rebels have a very limited game.

Yes, my wife wrote the Imperial notes for the game in the voice of the Emperor. She had a blast talking like him most of the game, it kind of weirded me out ...

One more piece of advice - the board spaces are big enough that you can place probe cards right on them and not interfere with play. For first time players, I suggest doing that for tracking purposes, unless you want to use the nice print outs some people have provided.

Great write-up! Really fun to read, and I'm very happy for you that your first game of Rebellion together was so enjoyable!

McClaud wrote:

One more piece of advice - the board spaces are big enough that you can place probe cards right on them and not interfere with play. For first time players, I suggest doing that for tracking purposes, unless you want to use the nice print outs some people have provided.

I'll actually have to disagree with you there. If the Rebels know exactly where the Imperials have searched with probes, it gives them a tremendous advantage. Whatever convenience it provides to the Imperial player is almost guaranteed to be overtaken by frustration at the Rebels having much better insight into their strategy.

Great write-up! Really fun to read, and I'm very happy for you that your first game of Rebellion together was so enjoyable!

McClaud wrote:

One more piece of advice - the board spaces are big enough that you can place probe cards right on them and not interfere with play. For first time players, I suggest doing that for tracking purposes, unless you want to use the nice print outs some people have provided.

I'll actually have to disagree with you there. If the Rebels know exactly where the Imperials have searched with probes, it gives them a tremendous advantage. Whatever convenience it provides to the Imperial player is almost guaranteed to be overtaken by frustration at the Rebels having much better insight into their strategy.

I did mention first time players.

When you both play for the first time, you're playing to learn both sides of the game. I couldn't follow her strategy for the first time until I started figuring out how you should think around the probe cards, both as the Empire and the Rebel.

But yes, when you learn how to play, don't show the Rebels where you've probed. Let them sweat it out a little. Our second game she feinted me out by pretending to believe I was in a space she had already probed. I thought I was being clever until the fleet took a sudden RIGHT turn towards my base. I realized then she had probed that system since she was not interested in it after that.

Then it was basically who flinched first. Either she changed her guess or I started cranking up production in the path to prevent an easy attack.

Nathan, what an excellent review. I had visions of 'Robot Chicken' in my head the whole time. Mate, well done on finding a fresh way to convey a Star Wars Rebellion story. Very entertaining; several times there I was actually laughing.